Graffiti targets family

Hate crimes

Posted: Sunday, September 19, 2004

By Joe Johnsonjoe.johnson@onlineathens.com

Although Athens-Clarke County is only one generation removed from the days of segregated public schools, it is a culturally diverse community in which officials said blatant acts of racial hate have become rare.

That is why 22-year-old Anthony Davis was stunned when he awoke one morning last week to find someone had spray-painted swastikas and the epithet "Die Nigger" on a door and wall at his mother's home in Tara Apartments off Gaines School Road.

"I thought we'd gotten away from that kind of thing in this day and age," said Davis, who is planning to return to the University of Georgia after a brief hiatus.

The element of racism that is apparent in the graffiti is why the case has been classified as a hate crime by the Athens-Clarke County Police Department.

Davis said if the person responsible for leaving the hateful messages is caught, he would press charges and seek prosecution under the state hate crime statute.

"This is something I take very seriously," he said.

Davis, who is black, said, "I hang out with all types of people," not looking at skin color when choosing friends. He had an idea who might be responsible, saying that the person had "shown her true colors."

Sgt. Nick Aguilar, who heads his department's graffiti removal unit, said the incident was the first instance of such vandalism he was aware of in his eight years on the Athens-Clarke police force.

"I'm surprised that that happened," he said. "It is very unusual for Athens-Clarke County to have racial slurs like that."

Nevertheless, the days of Jim Crow "separate but equal" laws are not that long ago. It's been just under 35 years since Clarke County public schools became fully desegregated. Although the Civil Rights Act was passed by Congress and signed into law in 1964, it wasn't until 1970 that Clarke County had fully dismantled separate learning facilities for whites and blacks and implemented a plan to integrate its school system.

Davis' mother, Beverly Ponder, said the racist graffiti that besmirched her home until a maintenance crew removed it left her feeling fearful, that she had been targeted by someone because of her race. "It was on the door, so I know it was directed at us," said Ponder, who works at a local hair salon. "For them to be brave enough to come up and do something like that really makes me concerned."

Although the vandalism at Tara Apartments has been classified a hate crime, the 2002 hate crime statute has been invoked in Athens-Clarke County only once before. Under the law, prosecutors who believe a defendant "intentionally selected any victim or any property of the victim as the object of the offense because of bias or prejudice" can ask the trial judge for an enhanced sentence that could add not only five years to a prison term, but require a defendant to serve 90 percent of the sentence before being eligible for any form of parole or early release.

Earlier this year, a former Gwinnett County sheriff's deputy was convicted of violating his oath of office in a case in which an Athens woman accused him of raping her because she was a lesbian. Prosecutors had filed notice with the court they intended to evoke the hate crime statute if the defendant were to be convicted of rape, but he was acquitted by a jury of that and other more serious charges.

The fact there is a hate crime law on the books is another reason why Aguilar found it difficult to believe someone would so brazenly show their racist feelings.

"The consequences of apprehending someone for something like this is very, very serious," he said.